"Expending His Energy to Promote Your Power."

Part I: Data


[This is some of the data I was looking at in preparation for the essay. There are magic numbers in here, but I have not yet the time to investigate fully. The entire essay is a work in progress, as I hope is evident. Were I, in my present station, to follow through to its absolute completion, alone, it would take many years simply to acquire the education necessary. If this sounds intriguing, I encourage any and all assistance. We are in this together, after all.]

 

Population Stats: Total: 308,745,538

 

Kansas: 2,853,118

 

– foreign population: 177, 139 = 6.2% (no matter)

 

In Kansas:

High School Graduates, age 25+: 89.2%

 

Bachelor’s Degrees, age 25+: 29.3%

 

Labor force: 1,494,540

 

Employed: 1,390,619

Free Labor force: 104, 921

 

Mean Travel time to work: 18.8 minutes

Households: 1,101,672; Total Units: 1,222,749

Persons/household: 2.48

House heating fuel: 79% gas

20% electric

 

Working Population = 2,175,144 age 16+, (minus) 376,611 age 65+ = 1,798,533

Total employed = 1,390,619

“Unemployed” = 407,914

(minus) free labor force = 103,997

 

Industry (% of employed)1

 

Ag, forest, mining = 3.6%

Construction = 6.4%

Manufacturing: 13.4%

Wholesale = 3.0%

Retail = 11.1%

Transportation = 4.9%

& warehousing

Information = 2.6%

Finance and Insurance = 6.3%

& real estate

Administrative Science = 8.3%

& waste management

Education & Health care & Social sciences = 23.7%

Entertainment & Food Service = 7.7% (entertainment is the lesser contributor)

Public Admin = 4.7%

Other Services = 4.4%

 

Energy Consumption & Production

 

So, for an average conversion of kWh to diesel fuel, we find that:

 

449 Miligals. diesel

creates

62 trillion Btu

 

AND

 

4,695 mil kWh

creates

20 trillion Btu

 

TRANSIT

 

mil. kWh —–> tril. Btu

2000: 299 2005: 288 2009: 234.75 = increasing efficiency

 

2000: 1/3,300 (how much heat is created with each *use unit* of electricity.)

2005: +- 1/3,600

2009: +- 1/4,500 (the efficiency of electricity, it’s “strength”, is increasing; it can DO MORE, WITH LESS, being that each Btu is a release of heat, less kWh to create more Btu means better efficiency, further for each unit, more “punch”.)

 

mil. gal Diesel —–> tril. Btu

2000: 7.20 2005: 7.16 2009: 7.24 = static efficiency

 

mil. gal petrol —–> tril. Btu

2000: 7.99 2005: 8.0 2009: 8.0 = static efficiency

 

AIR TRANSPORT

 

mil. gal jet fuel —–> tril. Btu

2000: 6.95 2005: 7.07 2009: 8.20 = decreasing efficiency? (weight? larger planes? lower mileage? But why?)

 

RAIL TRANSPORT & FREIGHT

 

mil. gal diesel —–> tril. Btu

2000: 7.2 2005: 7.2 2009: 7.2

 

All Highway Consumption:

2000: 19.164 (tril. Btu) 2005: 20,641 2009: 20,783 = Lower (w/efficiency)

 

Electrical Generation

 

Consumed(respective unit) Produced (bil.kWh) Rate

2000 2005 2009 2000 2005 2009 2000 2005 2009

Coal: 995 1041 934 1966 2012 1755 1.97 1.93 1.87

Petrol: 195 206 67 111 122 39 0.56 0.59 0.58

Nat. Gas: 5.7 6.0 7.1 601 761 921 105.4 126.8 129.7

 

Nuclear: ———————- 753 782 798

Hydroelec.: ———————- 275 270 273

GeoTherm: ———————- 14.1 14.7 15.0

Solar: ———————- 0.5 0.6 0.9

Wind: ———————- 5.6 17.8 73.9

 

Total Elec. Generation (2010) = 4,120 bil kWh

 

Kansas Net Generation (2009) = 46.7 bil kWh

 

Total Energy Consumption (2010): +-98 quadril. Btu (using all fuel & elec.)

Generation (2010): +-75 quadril. Btu (by fossil fuel)

(2010): +-22 quadril. Btu (by renewable elec.)

Expenditure Result Rate

Coal (2009): 21.63 quadril. Btu 1755 bil. kWh 1,232.47

Hydroelc. (2009): 2.67 quadril. Btu 273 bil. kWh 9,780.22

[what mean?]

*SCRATCHES*

So… a 354 MW power plant running at maximum capacity can create 1.3M kWh, enough to power 120,000 homes.2

Average Energy Usage:

335.9 mil. Btu/person = total, including transportation consumption

East-North-Central/household usage = 117.7 mil. Btu

Midwest = 113.5 mil. Btu.3

To Fuel Average Consumption in the Midwest:

Electricity: 10,790 kWh ALSO 107.9 mil. Btu

Nat. gas: 83,000 ft3 85.6 mil. Btu

Fuel oil: 528 gal. 73.3 mil. Btu

LPG: 652 gal. —————-

Vehicle Consumption (Midwest 2001, released 2005):

Average/household = 2.0 vehicles; 23,700 miles traveled; 1,176 gals. petrol

Fuel usage/car = 588 gals. petrol/year

1 gal. petrol/125 Btu

Transit = 1 gal. diesel/139 Btu

1 kWh/4,260 Btu (seems overly efficient; something wrong with calculation, or usage of kWh for public transit)

Wind Turbine Stats

The GE 1.5 MW series – 37 meter blades, high commonality in spare parts, 65 or 80 meter heights, standard or cold weather, clockwise from upward. Maintenance employs how many per unit?

Hydroelectric is limited, and may only be expected to account for 15-20% of production, tops. Reduce the necessary coverage of the total to that amount to determine necessary wind or solar installations.

Grand Coulee Dam4

(6,809 MW) – pump generating 314 MW for 600 MW (storage rate)

3rd powerplant: penstock 12 meter diameter, maximum supply of water is 35,000 ft3/sec. (for each generator)

3 generators using this flow – 805 MW capacity each

Battery Complex in China, Hebei Province5

– world’s biggest battery complex

– 36,000 kWh

– takes up 1 acre of land

– made of iron phosphate (mostly? what other materials required?)

– service life of 20 years

– efficiency transfer of 95%

Energy Usage/unit Food6

– 12.4 billion bushels of corn

– 147.2 bushels/acre

– 84 million acres total

Farm Expenditures7

– cost $289 bil. in 2010

– $5,883/farm fuel cost

– $131,793/farm total

Land Area

– 2.2 million farms total

– 917 mil. acres total land

– 420 acres/farm avg.

In Kansas:

– 65,500 farms

– 46 mil. acres total land

– 702 acres/farm avg.

1Census.gov – American Community Survey – Social, Economic, Housing, Demographical

Census.gov – Statistical Abstract

2SEGS: Solar Energy Generating Systems:

– built by NextEra Energy Resources; Luz Industries bankrupted en route

– 354 MW installed capacity; 936,384 mirrors and cover 1600 acres; mirrors are 94% reflective; wind breaks mirrors ocassionally; mirrors heat synthetic oil, routed to water heat transfer; then to steam turbines

– Employs 140 people, presently.

3EIA: 2005 residential Energy Consumption Survey

4Stats from Wikipedia.org

5from Pop. Sci., 01/04/12 AND Energy Matters, 01/03/2012.

6Crop Production 2011 Summary – USDA Reports

7Farm Expenditures 2010 Summary (released August 2011) – USDA Reports